BOB FLOWERDEW’S ORGANIC GARDENING
Bob explains how you can make your own feeds
WHENEVER you water your plants, you could be fertilising them for free by adding your own liquid plant food. This is surprisingly easy to make. Steeping fresh healthy foliage and soft stems under water for more than a week turns these into a nutritious smelly soup with stringy bits.
The most often made is from comfrey (Symphytum species, tough herbaceous perennials with lots of big lush leaves). Nicknamed ‘comfrey tea’, it closely mimics the chemical analysis of conventional greenhouse tomato feed. Although intended for tomatoes, the high potash levels suits other plants such as roses, apples, gooseberries, potatoes, beet and onions. Comfrey tea is sometimes used as a general plant feed but when given too often, that high potassium may turn some other plants yellow in protest (and so in error they probably get given more).
Considered a better balanced feed than comfrey is ‘stinging nettle tea’, this is also reckoned to make plants more resistant to pests and diseases.
My favourite though, is borage tea. It’s quick to make and you can sow these annual plants almost anywhere. In fact almost any healthy plants – even weeds – can be utilised, though preferably those with lush foliage and succulent stems, which for balance are best mixed together. So collect what you can and steep the lot well crushed up. Make a new batch every few weeks, the discarded stringy bits are good for your compost bin.
Now after cutting back hard, most herbaceous plants shoot up a new flush of soft growth, which makes more and better liquid feed than older foliage. However, do not cut down any plant more than a few times a year or you may fatally weaken it, even stinging nettles. And make sure liquid feed is well diluted in water, say a cupful a watering can. ■
“My favourite is ‘borage tea’”